Kenneth Blom - "Between Dream and Reality"
“Something that has surprised us positively is not only the interest and sales of Kenneth Blom immediately at Art Herning, but also that Blom hits so wide. We have sold one Blom painting to a 23-year-old young man who has saved up to buy it for his new apartment, and we sold another to a 75-year-old customer who is obviously a different place in life.
I've been in the business all my life, and I've traded with all the great artists, but it's rare that I've seen an artist's works hit so wide and so deeply at the same time. " - Anette Birch, owner of Galerie Birch
The large paintings are best experienced with lots of space. Therefore, the exhibition has been moved from Galerie Birch's own premises in Palægade to the neighbor, Klassik Flagship Store on the corner of Palægade and Bredgade.
The exhibition opens on Thursday, March 5 with a reception from 17-20, and will also be open during the Klassik Flagship Store's normal opening hours until March 28.
The artist will be present for the opening and again on Saturday, March 7.
Exhibition: Kenneth Blom - Between Dream and Reality Classic Flagship Store
Bredgade 3, Copenhagen K
Organizer: Galerie Birch
Palægade 5, Copenhagen K
Opening hours: Monday-Friday 11-18 and Saturdays 11-16
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Proximity and distance
Kenneth Blom's depictions of fleeting figures in neutral, architectural spaces evoke both a sense of closeness and a recognition of a distance that arises in the gap between the individual and its surroundings - and not least each other.
Like the Impressionists, he seeks to capture the beauty of the fleeting moment - a sunset, the pace of the big city, the rapid change of surroundings.
Kenneth Blom was born in Denmark but raised in Norway. His path to art is a tale of the arbitrariness of life and how to trace others in a direction that, in hindsight, could not be different. At the same time, Kenneth Blom's works tell their own story of life's existential issues.
Skagen calls
Like most others, Kenneth Blom's youth is characterized by a restlessness and a search for focus. As the son of a successful designer for Georg Jensen, he grows up among creativity and artist children. Instead of being sent to boarding school to find peace and direction, the father makes a decisive decision to send his son to art school in Oslo. After two weeks at school and without a previous interest in creating art, Kenneth experiences a clear vision. He is on the right track.
At the Academy of Fine Arts in Oslo, the teaching style is characterized by the concept art of the 90s. The students are encouraged to deal with installation and video art in particular, but the medium does not appeal to the young Norwegian artist.
On a study trip to Skagen, an all-encompassing sense of kinship arises with the contradiction of provocation - Skagen painters' florid and romantic depictions of life's quiet moments. Kenneth Blom immediately recalls the distinctive light and his very first encounter with the former artist's colony during a visit to Skagen with his father as a child.
This found source of inspiration does not fall into good ground with the academy professors, who have long declared the painting too dead. From Kenneth Blom's vintage it would later prove that only the painters broke internationally. It is worthwhile to stand firm, also as a sole proprietor.
An international breakthrough
In 1996 Kenneth Blom comes to work with the gallery artist Haaken Christensen in Oslo, with whom Børge Birch, the founder of Galerie Birch, had a long-standing collaboration on the Cobra artists. Through the relationship with Galleri Haaken, Kenneth Blom's works are quickly and solidly placed among the Norwegian big collectors.
In 2008, Kenneth Blom will be offered a separate exhibition at Sotheby's in London as the first living artist. It is Blom's New York gallerist, who is also the nephew of Jackson Pollock, who makes the contact. Kenneth Blom has since become one of the few living artists whose works achieve the same if not higher price at auction than at first sale.
If one wonders why Kenneth Blom is only now being shown in Denmark, the simple answer is that he has never been asked. Anette Birch, art dealer and proprietor of Galerie Birch believes that the time has long been ripe to present his works to the Danish public.